The Presidency of the United States of America is a democratically elected position which is won by an eligible candidate who successfully competes in a quadrennial national election. Generally, each of the three major political parties, including the Democratic, Republican and Independent parties, endorses and sponsors a presidential candidate at partisan caucuses held prior to the election. Although the majority of the American voting public typically votes for a candidate from one of the three major parties, additional candidates which may include one of the major party candidates may be endorsed and/or sponsored by one or more minor political parties.
According to the presidential election process, a candidate must accumulate a majority share of electoral college votes to succeed to the Office of the President. The only other elective federal official not elected by direct, i.e., popular, vote is the Office of the Vice President. Every fourth year, each state chooses as many electors to the Electoral College as it has senators and representatives in Congress. There are 100 senators and 435 representatives, which when added to the three electors representing the District of Columbia as provided by the 23rd Amendment to the Constitution, totals 538 members of the Electoral College. Of this number, 270 electoral votes, i.e., a majority vote, are needed to elect the president and vice-president. The voting decisions of the electors may be based on the outcome or trend of a popular vote which is tallied in each state. However, the outcome of the electoral college vote may not necessarily reflect the outcome of the popular vote, which includes all of those votes tallied and reported by each state. Moreover, reporting of the near-final popular vote generally occurs during the evening hours of Election Day, that reporting generally being chronologically staggered from the eastern part of the country to the western part of the country.
It is a common misunderstanding that a majority popular vote for a particular candidate determines the ultimate outcome of the election, when in fact, it is the final electoral college vote that actually determines the successful candidate, which may be different from the candidate who won the popular vote. Also, both the popular vote and the electoral college vote may be swayed by changes in voting patterns based on news media-generated projections and predictions as individual state popular votes are tallied and reported to the public prior to the time the polls are closed.
Accordingly, the U.S. presidential election process has been found to be confusing, complex and difficult to comprehend by many people who are being newly acquainted or reacquainted with the election process each quadrennial election year or who are studying the political process of the United States of America. In particular, there is a special need for providing this education to recent immigrants who are preparing for naturalization and students who are studying the American political process.